More than 100,000 books have been collected and will be sold this weekend.
Volunteer Jody Engel, of East Syracuse, sorts donated books Friday that will be sold at a Newspaper In Education book sale that begins Friday. Local libraries dropped off items from their collections.
Teachers donated children’s books and instruction manuals.
Hundreds of Central New Yorkers dropped off books at local grocery stores.
More than 100,000 books have been collected and will be sold this weekend to raise money to bring more newspapers to children in area classrooms. The sale, organized by The Post-Standard’s Newspaper in Education program, will be Friday, Saturday and Sunday at the former Bon-Ton store in ShoppingTown Mall.
Books will be arranged by genres and popular authors. Shoppers can buy hardcovers for $2, two paperbacks for $1 and children’s hard covers for $1 each. All money from the sale will go to the education program.
The NIE program, which brings newspapers into area classrooms, also hosts cartoon and essay contests and stock exchange games to teach finance.
“Our goal is to promote literacy and help students improve skills in all other subjects,” said Vicki Krisak, coordinator for the program.
Book-sale organizers began accepting donations in June.
The Syracuse City School District donated more than 65 tables for the sale. Wegmans Food Markets made some of its grocery stores places where books could be donated and the Everson Museum, which leases the store space, donated the location.
The original goal for the book sale was to raise $5,000, Krisak said. But she expects the sale could raise much more.
“This is a real community event,” Krisak said. “The outpouring of contributions from the community has been just amazing. We never expected this kind of a response.”
Contact Lyndra Vassar at 470-2259 or lvassar@syracuse.com.